564 (Spring 2020)

PHYS 564: General Relativity (Spring 2020)

(NB: The lectures in Spring quarter will be conducted remotely using Zoom. Please familiarize yourself with this technology. I will likely be

using an iPad Pro with a stylus to interact with the class via Zoom. Sessions will be recorded and made available.)

TTH 11:30-12:50pm PAA A110

Instructor: Silas Beane B457 OH: Friday noon zoom and by appointment

TA: Kade Cicchella OH: by appointment

Subject matter

General relativity.

Prerequisites

PHYS 515. Note that this is an advanced graduate course in physics. Prerequisites for highly-ambitious undergraduates

are PHYS 226 or equivalent, and the core E&M sequence (PHYS 321,322 and 323, with 323 possibly taken concurrently).

Main resources

My favorite text which will guide the course spiritually is:

Gravitation and Cosmology, S. Weinberg

This text is somewhat compact. Fortunately, there is an excellent, encyclopaedic online text by Matthias Blau, which fills

in many details in Weinberg's text and provides many more useful and topical additions:

I can't emphasize enough how useful this reference is.

I will be using my own lecture notes compiled from many sources (including those listed below), but primarily Weinberg and Blau.

I will scan my lecture notes and link them to this page and I will link zoom recordings of the lectures as well. In the "suggested

reading" column of the calendar below, I will indicate relevant sections of various texts, including Carroll (as this seems to be a

favorite of many).

Other useful resources

Lecture notes:

Introduction to General Relativity, G. 't Hooft

An advanced course in General Relativity, E. Poisson

Advanced texts:

General Relativity, R. Wald

Gravitation, C.W. Misner, K.S. Thorne, J.A. Wheeler

Intermediate texts:

Introduction to General Relativity, L. Ryder

Spacetime and Geometry, S.M. Carroll

Introductory texts:

Gravity. An Introduction to Einstein's General Relativity, J. Hartle

A First Course in General Relativity, B. Schutz

Homework, exams and grades

Your grade for this course will be based on the homework, which will be assigned approximately once a week. Two of the homeworks will

count more than the others and are referred to on the calendar as "exams" (homework=60%, "exams"=40%). I encourage you to work on the

homework in groups. However, the work that you hand in must be your own, and you must list your collaborators on your manuscript as well

as any references you have used (if you find a solution to a problem on the web, you must cite the url, if you find the solution in a book, you

must cite the book, etc.). No collaboration with other humans or intelligent beings is permitted on the exams. However, all other sources are

fair game and, of course, must be cited, as described above. The homework assignments and exams will (generally) be due on Monday in the

TA's mailbox in the physics department office.

Religious Accommodations

Washington state law requires that UW develop a policy for accommodation of student absences or significant hardship due to reasons of faith or conscience, or for organized religious activities. The UW’s policy, including more information about how to request an accommodation, is available at Religious Accommodations Policy (https://registrar.washington.edu/staffandfaculty/religious-accommodations-policy/). Accommodations must be requested within the first two weeks of this course using the Religious Accommodations Request form (https://registrar.washington.edu/students/religious-accommodations-request/).

Calendar